


Haikyuu IN SPACE!!

by JustAnotherGuest



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Artificial Intelligence, Gen, Mecha
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2020-12-21
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:48:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28210425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustAnotherGuest/pseuds/JustAnotherGuest
Summary: Kageyama Tobio is training to be Karasuno's best mecha pilot. As a brilliant navigator with impeccable aim, he should have this in the bag.But between snarky AIs, enemies with twice the firepower, and a possible traitor in the ranks, it's proving to be a bit more difficult than he had planned.
Relationships: Hinata Shouyou & Kageyama Tobio
Comments: 3
Kudos: 7





	Haikyuu IN SPACE!!

The warehouse bay is interrogation bright. Echoes follow the cluster of new recruits, none of which Tobio has bothered to learn the names of. He walks near the rear of the pack, deeply etched scowl pinching his mouth, his eyes, his brow. 

Razor edges and slick chrome gleam like the prows of great ships from the shadowy corners of the warehouse. These military grade mechas almost scrape the ceiling, a stark contrast to the rookie issued mech suits. 

"Oi, you recruits!" says Major Ukai around the unlit cigarette hanging from his lip. His boots click on the tiles, as shiny as the zipper on his flight suit and the earrings glinting under bleached hair. "We don't have a lot of time today, so let's get you all hooked up to your interfaces. Lieutenant Takeda will be distributing these drives," Ukai holds a tiny chip pinched between finger and thumb, "Ask the person next to you for help if you need it, but get plugged in and start familiarizing yourselves with the HUD.”

Two of the recruits ask each other for assistance. Tobio fingers the port implant at the back of his own neck. He brings the chip close enough to touch the soft metal and the internal magnets grab it, sliding the chip into place with a click that rattles his teeth. Bright and dark spots flicker at his peripherals before sharpening into familiar diagrams and numbers. Containers for speed, location, atmospheric affects, fuel gauge, and a few that Tobio doesn’t recognize, all empty or set to zero at the moment. These readouts are far more extensive than those of the training HUDs. 

Ukai leads the team over to a smaller, secondary hangar, where the unpaired mechas are stored. 

Six mechas are hung three to a wall. One for each of them. They range in size and colour, some showing significant remnants of wear and tear. Tobio tries not to dwell on what happened to their previous pilots. 

Six small VR treadmills are set up in the middle of the floor. Takeda hands out the headsets.

"Each of you will cycle through a basic version of the AIs for these mechas. Run through the simulation until you find one that you can beat the benchmark score with." Ukai crosses his arms. "First scorer gets first dibs on that mecha. You have two hours." 

Tobio takes his headset and straps himself into the treadmill's restraining hoop. The belts turn and rotate as he does. The headset fits heavy and snug, his HUD overlapping perfectly with the VR display. A technical line drawing of a mecha under the name 2K3MA-K fills Tobio's view. It’s the tallest one of the batch, its long, sniperlike shoulder cannons and radar turrets lend itself to distance and precision. Perfect.

The AI engages and 2K3MA's stats fill the containers. Some containers switch sides of Tobio's peripherals, others disappear entirely. The power and battery life look good, and the range is incredible. Tobio shuffles the display to the sides, everything growing smaller until he can see the mock battlefield stretching out before him. The mecha is eye level with softly swaying, low poly treetops, looking out over partially rendered hills and an overcast sky. 

And the enemy mecha with arm cannons raised, the barrels glowing with plasma fire. 

Tobio commands his mecha to dodge, and it does, making Tobio's stomach lurch. These mechas are huge, and the landscape swings wildly. 2K3MA loses its shoulder cannon in the process. 

Tobio raises the mecha's remaining shoulder cannon, shoots, and… waits for the cannon to finish raising… shoots again. The enemy mecha ducks away with ease. Returns fire. An obnoxiously flashing text box lights up the corner of Tobio’s HUD, ‘AUTOPILOT Requesting Access’. Tobio tries to dismiss the box, but it refuses. 

Tobio is running the mecha in a perimeter around the enemy, keeping one step ahead of the plasma fire. Trees explode around him, and pixelated leaves fill his view. The conveyer hoop yanks him down as the mecha trips. Tobio aims the shoulder cannon at the enemy’s navigation array. The shot misses as the cannon lags, and the ‘AUTOPILOT’ notification shifts to the center of the screen. Tobio growls and shifts the box to the side, still not able to dismiss it completely. 

“Battery low.” The voice of the AI is bored and almost scathing. Tobio checks the indicator and the power levels have been cut in half. Tobio double takes. No way is that correct. Has a fuel line been damaged? Or the sensor? 

“Diagnose,” says Tobio. 

“Switch to Autopilot to preserve battery life.” The ‘AUTOPILOT’ notification pops up in the center of the screen again. 

Tobio shoves the box away. “Diagnose fuel lines.” 

“Battery levels critical, switching to Autopilot.”

“No! You stupid-” 

The HUD flashes as it reboots, and when it comes back online, the mecha is charging full force away from the enemy. 

Tobio yanks at the controls and they don’t respond. The battery level has stabilised, and aside from a handful of warnings about the damage to the arm and shoulder cannon, the mecha should be able to turn around and take out the enemy with a well-placed shot. 

“2K3MA,” Tobio yells. “Re-engage!” Tobio mashes at the controls, trying to swivel the navigation turret around so that he can see the enemy at least. 

A plasma blast impacts the back of the mecha’s knee and 2K3MA goes down. 

“Get up! Get up you worthless piece of scrap!” Tobio yells at the mecha when it shows no signs of picking itself up. Tobio starts digging through the schematic subfolders, throwing levers and hunting for anything that looks like a manual override. The rookie mech suits weren’t anywhere near this finicky. You tell your mecha to do something and it does it, no questions asked. 

Tobio gains control of the navigation turret, just in time to see the enemy mecha plunge a huge plasma saw through the 2K3MA’s back. The HUD goes dark with the words ‘FAILED’ stamped across Tobio’s retinas. 

Tobio tears off the headset, breathing hard and glaring at his teammates. Most are still locked into their VR setups, although the squad leader and the kid with grey hair look like they’ve finished their simulations and are inspecting their newly paired mechas, one of which looks to be the most menacing of the bunch, with samurai inspired armour plating and massive gatling cannons. The other is all wrapped in chains and spikes and glows red at the seams. 

“Is there a problem, Kageyama?” Lieutenant Takeda asks, taking a step in Tobio’s direction. Tobio scowls and shakes his head, jamming the headset back in place. Three of the mecha line drawings in the start menu are greyed out, and the 2K3MA has the addition of a red slash through it. Tobio cycles through the remaining mechas, skimming their stats for speed and stamina. Tobio has enough precision for any mecha, but that won’t mean jack spit if the mecha is too slow to keep up with him. 

The H9A-SHO is small and doesn’t have any weapons worth mentioning. The KN8A-ZSHE and ENS8A-HKRA look much more promising. Tobio toggles the KN8A, but the drawing goes grey. One of the other recruits has paired with it. Kageyama swears and selects the ENS8A. 

It goes about as well as the match with 2K3MA. 

Slow response times. Weak firepower when the attack does go through. Tobio grows more and more frustrated throughout the match until the mecha staggers to the ground, riddled with plasma bolts and dripping oil. ‘FAILED’ flashes and boots Tobio back to the start menu. 

The last mecha rotates slowly on the display. Tobio grudgingly selects it. Better to get this one out of the way, and retake the test when there’s more mechas to choose from. The thought cuts deeply into Tobio’s pride, churning in his stomach like acid.

The HUD flashes and syncs up, and to Tobio’s dismay, half of the containers disappear completely. There’s less features in this thing than in the training suits. Just a single plasma thrower, and some gauges for fuel and the various pressures and torques that are at work on the machine. The rudimentary forcefield fluctuates weakly. 

And it’s small. Even smaller than he had expected. At least the 2K3MA was tall enough that Tobio could get a lay of the land. In the H9A, the computer generated branches sway high above the mecha’s eye level. One good kick from an enemy would lay this mecha out cold. 

The hiss of a plasma missile is all the warning Tobio gets before the world goes up in flames, the VR hoop holds him tight as the forest spins around him. He waits for the ‘FAILED’ notification to appear against the dust and debris, relief battling against disappointment. 

The mecha jumps to its feet, and the trees pass by in a blur. Tobio grapples for the controls, his first instinct being that the mecha slipped into Autopilot during the explosion and that he now has to deal with the same crap that the 2K3MA pulled. 

The navigation turret bends easily to his will, the plasma thrower charging readily as Tobio aims it into the trees. The mecha is still sprinting along on its own, its internal systems calculating the distance between trunks and avoiding dips and branches. 

There’s another missile hiss, but it falls well behind the H9A before it explodes. Tobio engages the radar, trying to pinpoint their attacker. The H9A is already sprinting back towards the source of the explosions, ducking and dodging craters and fire until they are in an open field and the enemy mecha is within spitting distance. 

The enemy shoots a missile point blank. The H9A kicks off the ground, its small build taking advantage of the explosion to launch itself high into the air. Tobio aims the plasma thrower down at the enemy and fires off a plasma burst. It hits the enemy squarely in the armoured arm it brings up to fend them off. The H9A kicks off the arm and Tobio fires off another round into the enemy’s back. The enemy staggers, but then brings its armoured arm out in a sweeping motion, catching the H9A and punting it across the ground. The H9A springs back to its feet in time to catch another point blank missile to the face. The explosion whites out the HUD briefly before it goes dark. 

Tobio’s adrenaline is skipping like a stone across a pond, the black screen threatening to send him plunging into despair. This was it. He’d have to join another rookie squadron. Start from scratch and hope for a better pairing next time. 

A small, traitorous part of his heart rebels. Even though the H9A-SHO is small and pathetically underpowered, for just a moment there, he had almost been having fun. 

Tobio blinks as the green text fills the HUD. 

‘PAIRED.’ 

**Author's Note:**

> i don't have a posting schedule, but i have a bit of time to write on the weekends, so we'll see what happens! (this has a complete outline, and might be around 10 chapters long)


End file.
